FindFamilyCrest.com

"You can walk down the street right past a third or fourth cousin and not know it."

BOSTON - I always thought that genealogy was for people whose blood ran blue. It was for folks who traced their ancestry to the Mayflower or the American Revolution, not those who came over in steerage one ... via Statesman Journal

I am looking for my birth mother. I was born in Jan, 1971 in Bathurst New Brunswick and was adopted by a military family. via Cousinconnect.com

"I was there for four days, but you need a longer time. The material they have is just mind boggling."

Darlene Plautz of Merrill won't be satisfied until all the pieces of her family tree are put in place. via Wausau Daily Herald

I'm looking for information on the family of Adeline Tinker born in Berkshire County, Massachusetts in 1819 who married Andrew B. Downs. via Cousinconnect.com

' The Association of Professional Genealogists will conduct a roundtable on Tuesday, May 13, 2008 during the National Genealogical Society Conference at the Hyatt Regency Crown Center in Kansas City, Missouri. via Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter

Charleston Police Sgt. Erik Page was looking for the tombstone's proper home, when a story about it ran in The Post and Courier this past Monday. via Post and Courier

I have seen a number of questions about the Family Tree Maker 2008 SP3 update over the past few days. I know that the development team is closing in on finalizing this patch. I’ve delivered three versions of the patch to both our alpha and beta teams. The input has been very positive. A fourth SP3 candidate will also likely be delivered to both groups. I apologize that some of my initial estimates of release dates for SP3 were off. The development team is taking the necessary time to ensure a stable and meaningful patch release.

Below is a list of enhancements and bug fixes currently included in SP3:

Enhancements/New features:

• Major enhancements to performance, improvements including:
  • Startup time
  • File load time
  • Report/Chart creation time
  • General navigation
  • Memory usage
• Major enhancements to stability throughout the program
• Book layout in charts for:
  • Descendant Chart
  • Hourglass Chart
  • Vertical Pedigree Chart
• Ability to create saved versions for all charts and reports
• Ability to apply predefined templates for charts
• Ability to save user created templates for charts
• Enhancements to place interactions, including:
  • New Change Place Name dialog allowing for easier changing of place name and description information
  • Double-clicking and right clicking additions to the Places workspace
• New Find-and-Replace dialog with additional ability to search with wildcards and to specify where to search in and enhanced information showing where the item was found.
• Major enhancements to the Analyze/Compact file functionality
• Outline Descendant report has Items to Include options
• Automatic simple backup at shutdown
• Ability to turn off place authority searching when entering place names
• Enhancements to the RTF export
• Ability to add nodes in charts to a “Marked Node” category and modify box settings for these nodes
• Preparer Information in the footer for charts
• Options to include spouses and children in filtering and exporting  of people

Major enhancements to Sources including:

People Workspace

• Copy and paste source-citations.  After copying (from source-citation dialog or sources toolbar), you can paste a duplicate source-citation or a link to the existing one via the “New” source menu.
• Ability to copy source-citation at creation for pasting

Sources Workspace

• Double-clicking on a source title in the “Sources” workspace displays the “Edit Source Title” dialog for easier editing of sources in this view.
• Double-clicking on a repository in the “Sources” workspace displays the “Edit Repository” dialog for easier editing of repositories in this view.
• Right-mouse menus have been added to the left panel.

Repository Dialog

• The “Repository” dialog is resizable.

Source Title Dialog

• The “Source Title” dialog includes a usage button that displays usage for that source (This is redundant in the “Source” workspace, but useful elsewhere).
• The “Source Title” dialog is resizable.

Source-Citation Dialog

• The “Source-Citation” dialog is resizable
• The “Source-Citation” dialog includes a reference to the number of linked facts.
• Addition of a copy button (see copy and paste source-citations above).

Find Source-Citation Dialog

• The option to “Link To Existing Source-Citation” is changed to “Use Existing Source-Citation.”  Then there are two buttons in the resulting “Find Source-Citation” dialog.  After finding and selecting a source-citation the user can choose “Link To Citation” or “Copy New Citation”.  The link option does the same as “OK” did before and the new copy option adds another easy way to create a duplicate source-citation.
• Performance when listing by people is greatly improved.
• The “View by” setting is remembered so that if you view by source title for example, it comes up that way the next time.
• Left and right panels are sized proportionally when the dialog is resized.

List of some of the higher priority bugs that have been fixed:

Charts

• Made default settings more like FTM 16 default settings.
• Changes made in Box, Border, and Line Options don’t force a chart reload unless necessary.
• Export to image decreases the resolution (DPI) of the image if the image is very large.
• Charting uses less memory.
• Charting draws faster.
• Saved chart dates and times work for international dates.
• The User Interface recognizes metric regions and sizes are shown in centimeters or millimeters for Metric regions.
• Improved drawing and scaling of the “Advanced” layout for Standard Pedigree charts in Poster layout.
• Background colors stay in synchronization which background images changes and vice-versa.
• Facts that are description centric, such as AKA, now default to options that are meaningful.
• Miscellaneous UI changes such as hiding the “Advanced” button when in book layout or not in Standard Pedigree charts.
• Improved loading time for Box, Border, and Line Options dialog, Fonts Dialog, and Page Setup.
• Improved pedigree line drawing for special conditions such as parent node smaller than child node in a Standard Pedigree.
• Improved the restoring of node sizes on reload or opening a saved chart.
• File dialog restores to last directory used.
• Quick Print Dialog did not have the correct values in the header control.
• Selected nodes in charts have “more emphasis” to show that they are selected.
• Improved displaying of all Shared Facts.
• Improved drawing speed and memory usage for pedigree lines in the pedigree chart.
• Improved drawing of pedigree lines in the pedigree chart by calculating the overlap and thus finding a new “center” point.
• The <LINE> “fact” or divider line can now be a different color and width than the pedigree line. This makes it possible to do some nice contrast inside of the person node.
• If a fact is changed it is picked up in the chart. The chart doesn’t reload and often the fact change is such that this doesn’t matter. If the chart does need to be regenerated there is now a generate button too.
• Saving of POSTER size images of all types of charts. (Export Image)
• Gradient node fill ability. Note that some printers can’t handle gradient and transparent at the same time.
• Throttle the chart size after 14 generations for Pedigree charts in poster layout. All other charts have a 99 generation limit now. Charts over 13 generations will set the spacing to collapsed.

Reports

• RTF output is not easily editable
• Photo album excludes non-image media items.
• Title includes primary person automatically for some reports
• Ahnentafel Report - blank lines between end notes
• Ahnentafel Report - disappears when checking Use short biographies
• Ahnentafel report - name and sex fact notes don’t display
• Export to RTF, data fields are underlined
• Individual Report - Name options don’t apply to all names
• Outline Descendant Report - export to RTF includes weird characters
• Outline Descendant Report - Items to include, include blank facts not working
• Outline Descendant Report - name of focus person not in title
• Place Usage Report - missing fact labels
• Register Report - Also Known As not displaying correctly
• Register Report - names in all caps
• Register Report - not seeing Name fact note
• Register Report and Ahnentafel Report - information repeating
• eport Titles not updating
• Spouse sorting in individual report is fixed
• Civil and Canon values in Kinship report is fixed
• Individual report sorting spouses incorrectly
• Notes do not appear correctly in reports
• Bold, Italic, & Underline in notes don’t appear in Individual Report
• Photo album report – images per row setting not working
• Documented Facts Report – non-preferred facts not appearing, their sources are
• Photo Album Report - blanks out with non-image media items
• Photo Album Report - sorting images (images are now sorted by caption and filename)
• Kinship Report - sorting individuals
• Register Report - crash saving report
• Research Note Report - not displaying bold, underline & italic in notes
• Relationship Report not working in People module
• Photo Album not working in People module
• Individual report displays preferred name for all name facts.
• Fixed numbering problem in Outline Descendant report

Find and Replace

• Clicking stop before results are found messes up what gets found and results in a crash
• Can’t find words with punctuation at the end
• Certain characters (<>) caused the found text to not be displayed
• Crash navigating to people collection after “Go To” from find and replace
• Change all place names dialog pops up even if there is only 1 fact associated with a place
• Can click find and replace when there is no tree loaded

Copy/Paste Sources

• Pasting Link/Copy to a source causes problems with the reference note
• Pasting a duplicate source doesn’t copy the source note
• Paste option not active on facts that have no data
• Ability to copy source from Manage Source view added

File Merge

• Marriage fact of preferred spouse was shown for all spouses in the host file
• Improved people matching
• File merge creates multiple relationships for the same person
• FTM crashes when merging creates a recursive relationship (i.e. child is his own father)
• Improved matching accuracy and performance when files are derivatives of each other

Web Merge

• Crash when changing a place name in web search and then merging
• Clicking on “Create Page Archive” before Web Search is completely loaded crashes FTM
• Source not added to sex fact if default merge settings were changed
• Added drop-down to select a different source title when editing source
• Web Merge Wizard dialog doesn’t display the correct instructions when merging images and notes (but no facts/people)
• Crash when editing a screen scraped place name and then trying to merge
• Multiple copies of the same media being saved to the media folder when merging the same Ancestry.com record multiple times

General

• People filter updated to be more correct
• Crash after compact then backing up fixed
• Gedcom export was doing certain fact types (description only, etc.)
• Export of living people no longer uses Living as their name. It keeps the name but hides all other facts.
• “Approximately” or “Approx.” should be recognized as “Abt. for dates
• Britain resolve place name selection of United Kingdom clears field
• If the history is empty it shows the same names as index
• Program crashes when you delete a person from the History panel
• Edit source dialog/Reference note doesn’t display citation text when is should
• Children sorting in family panel  fixed
• Change place name issues resolved (crashes when adding just description and other problems)
• Modified reference notes correctly imported
• Scrolling problem in source list in person view
• “Approximately” or “Approx.” now recognized as “Abt. for dates
• Relationship information now showing up in English installs in non-English speaking countries
• Crash when merging two people together, sometimes
• Crash when changing person’s name due to Operating System audio driver crash
• Crash when adding sources – it may crash one more time, then on restart fix the problem
• Crash when adding media types .gif and .ICO
• Fixes to resolving place names without a city name
• Non-preferred facts show up in reports
• Problems importing sources from FTM 2005 files
• Marriage data not showing in hourglass chart
• Ahnentafel numbers are not correct
• Export not working when “Include private Facts” deselected.
• Exporting a subset of people still includes all places, sources, etc.
• Resolve All Dialog doesn’t append to description it replaces the existing descry
• Register Report shows same info for multiple spouses
• Alternate names do not appear in the Family Group Sheet
• Error importing v2005 file
• Pressing the ESC key clears the data in a date or description field
• AKA appears out of order in charts and reports
• Media Item Report Export to .PDF not working correctly
• Printing a Pedigree Chart from People isn’t working
• Moving a place to a description then moves the description to the place
• Pedigree, Descendant, Hourglass, & Vertical Pedigree Charts - settings not saved
• Import of media caption and description is lost via PAF import
• Source not always being added from Web Merge
• Unknown dates not exporting to Gedcom
• Can’t delete project after running media report - media item held open
• UNK should be recognized when entered as a date as Unknown
• Importing GEDCOM file with normal tags
• Duplicate people showing up in relationship view

Last weekend I had the following conversation with my 5-year-old nephew, Alex.

Alex: “Where are you going?”

Me: “To the store.”

Alex: “Why?”

Me: “Because I want to buy some shoes.”

Alex: “Why?”

Me: “Because I’m a girl, and girls like shoes.”

Alex: “But you don’t need any shoes.”

Which, from an objective point of view, was certainly true. I had a whole closet full of shoes. I needed another pair of shoes like Alex needed another Buzz Lightyear action figure. But I didn’t feel like getting into a philosophical conversation about needs vs. wants with a preschool kid, especially if it meant forgoing a new pair of sandals in order to set a good example of fiscal restraint.

With that in mind, I’d like to tell you about a few things we’re doing here at AncestryPress to address both your needs and your wants. I’d also love to hear more about what you need in a self-publishing application (e.g., “I really need to print a book with more than 100 pages”) and what you want (e.g., “It would be cool if I could create a custom cover with one of my family photos on the front”).

Several customers have written in to say that they love the AncestryPress book building tool, but they just can’t do justice to their family history in 100 pages or less. If you share that sentiment, you’ll be glad to know that we’ve raised the limit to 250 pages. The binding process for longer books is slightly different — books over 100 pages are not hand stitched — but you can still expect a very high-quality product.

Several weeks ago we also added a large-format book (11″x14″) to the product line. The new size is obviously great for near-sighted people who prefer bigger fonts, but it also creates the look and heft of an heirloom-quality coffee table book.

If you’d like to make a large-format book, be sure to select the larger size when you start your project. At the current time, it isn’t possible to convert a book from the smaller size to the larger size or vice-versa, so please make a careful decision about which size you want when you start your project.

Your don’t have to choose the type of cover you want until you place your order, so it’s OK to change your mind about that halfway through the project. You could even order three copies of the same book with three different covers. And, just to be clear, you don’t have to do anything special to create a book that is longer than 100 pages. The only decision you really need to think through at the beginning of the process is the size of your book.

Finally, a quick word about the various cover options. Our basic book cover is “leatherette,” which is a paper-based material that simulates the texture of leather. People in the printing industry refer to it as nuba. The leatherette cover was our first product offering because in our early market research, most customers told us that what they really needed was an affordable way to publish their family history research.

Last month we added a bonded leather cover that is available in black and burgundy. Bonded leather is real leather that has been processed to enable it to go through an imprint machine, which allows us to stamp a gold foil title on the front.

Our leatherette cover comes in charcoal gray. It actually has a very nice look and feel. The biggest downside is that it won’t wear very well if you let kids spill stuff on it, whereas you can wipe peanut butter off the bonded leather and it will still look good as new.

I’d love to hear what you think of our current product offerings. Are we meeting your needs when it comes to book size, length, format and cover choices? Are you happy with the manufacturing quality of the printed output? Are there other products that you don’t really need — like the strappy yellow sandals I bought on Saturday — that you’d like to create just for fun?

May is Historic Preservation Month, and the national theme is "This Place Matters." In an effort to illustrate how much "This Place Matters," the city of Marshfield Historic Preservation Committee, Main Street ... via Marshfield News-Herald

The fact that people in English-speaking Canada seem to think that they can overlook anything done by the Quebecois has got to end immediately. via Magic City Morning Star